The Smell of Smoke and Rain
by TheOneThatGotAway99
Summary: Rain mists around him, droplets trickling off the ends of his spiked short hair and down his well-worn leather jacket, washing away the lingering scent of smoke that clung to him. Boot clad feet splash quietly on the rain drenched sidewalk. He doesn't need to turn to know it's his brother at his side. "We can't save everybody." [Gen; one-shot; rated for injury/death; not deathfic]


**The Smell of Smoke and Rain**

 _Warning: Mildly graphic descriptions of injury/death by fire. Please be advised._

Rain mists around him, droplets trickling off the ends of his spiked short hair and down his well-worn leather jacket, washing away the lingering scent of smoke that clung to him. Boot clad feet splash quietly on the rain drenched sidewalk. The grey of the sky reflects off the grey of the cement and water rushes by in streams along the asphalt road. He has no destination in mind, just away; he had picked a direction at random and started walking. He needs to clear his head, to stop thinking, and he is afraid – yes, _afraid_ – that if he got behind the wheel of that car right now, all he would do is think.

He's all of half a block's distance down the street when he hears the quick slap of familiar canvas shoes jogging to catch up. He doesn't need to turn to know it's his brother at his side. He matches his stride with his younger brother's, like he's done since he had helped teach the kid to walk twenty some years ago. It's unconscious, action on automatic. Doesn't matter that his brother is taller than him now, or that his gait is longer; he'll always be his baby brother.

The two walk in silence, side by side, the sky weeping overhead, until his gaze catches on a neighborhood playground a short ways up the street. He steers them towards it, feet squelching into the muddy grass drenched from this morning's heavy rains. It is a simple playground, a single rainbow colored jungle gym complete with slide and fireman's pole, reminding him of any other park he had taken his brother to when they were kids and needed to get out of whatever crap apartment or motel their dad had holed them up in at the time.

There is a swing set standing off to the side. He brushes off the water from the seat with a bare hand, breath ghosting white into the air, before he sits down facing his brother.

The kid's longer hair is speckled with fine pinpricks of rain, hands stuffed into the pockets of his canvas jacket, the shoulders of which are already damp from the weather. His brother studies him silently for a moment, glances down at the grass and up at the clouds, then moves towards the second swing, careful to avoid the brown puddle beneath it.

He hadn't expected the fire to have spread so much so fast, but by the time they had pulled up in front of the apartment complex that morning, the entire first floor was already ablaze. _Shouldn't rain prevent fire?_ He had thrown the car into park, tucked his Colt 1911 safely into his waistband, and bolted for the door without another thought, knowing his brother would be following close behind.

The heat had hit him before he was even fully through the door. Black smoke congested the air, billowed towards the ceiling, hindering his vision even worse than the too bright flames licking up the walls. He pressed the unbuttoned collar of his plaid shirt to his mouth as he marched his way down the apartment lined hallway, banging on each door he passed, calling out to anyone who could hear him to get out.

After the first floor had been cleared and he'd heard his brother stomping up the stairs towards the second story, he found a fire extinguisher by the elevator, as much good as that would be, and made his own way to the top floor.

There were twenty-seven people living in the tri-level complex, he knew – most of the top two floors empty and undergoing renovations – but not how many of those would have been there at the time. He and his brother had been watching the building, trying to prevent that exact thing from happening, but the monster had snuck past them the moment they had looked away, and it was just enough time to set the building on fire before the two of them could stop it.

He'd cleared the third floor quickly, extinguisher having proved more useful as a battering ram when he found a frantic group of people by an emergency exit that had been chained shut. He had just helped the last person on to the fire escape when his brother shouted his name; he had ran to the second floor without a moment's hesitation.

His brother's voice had led him to an apartment with the door off its hinges and an exterior wall completely alight. His brother was helping a thin, middle aged man to his feet, arm tugged securely around his shoulders. "I've got him, help her," his younger brother told him and gestured towards another door – behind which came a choked plea for help.

Obeying immediately, he had rushed over to kick in the door when the knob wouldn't turn, and stepped into the room.

He wouldn't soon be forgetting the scene that greeted him when he had.

He wraps his hands around the cold metal chains, swaying idly with a small kick of his leg, just listening to the squeak of the swings, the distant rumble of gentle thunder, and the drizzle of rain on the roof of the jungle gym and leaves of the nearby trees.

"We can't save everybody," his brother reminds him in a low voice.

Smoke was everywhere, the room filled with hungry flames. A strangled moan had grasped his attention, and he quickly moved towards the source of the sound. The woman was slumped stiffly under the window and it wasn't until he was crouched beside her, taking in the angry black and red burns covering most of her body that the smell hit him. Smoldering flesh and hair, blood and skin cooking in the all-consuming heat of the fire. The charred remains of her clothing clung to her like rotted spider webs and red oozed sluggishly from the raw patches of her limbs and torso, her face a mask of pain and ash. Barely recognizable as human, let alone female. She had opened her eyes, staring at him with pleading eyes.

He carefully doesn't look at his brother as he says, "I know."

She had been too far gone. He knew that, but he still tried to help her. As gently as he could, he had laid his plaid button up over the woman's burned body and scooped her carefully into his arms. Her lungs were too choked with smoke to scream, but she managed to moan as he laboriously carried her from the apartment, swallowing down the coughing fit begging to be let out of him.

Silence falls between them for another few minutes until his brother breaks it again. "It wasn't your fault."

He'd gotten halfway down the stairs to the smoke clogged ground floor before he'd noticed the woman had stopped breathing. He'd stumbled, coughs exploding from him, moving with frantic haste but strangled by the unforgiving smoke as flames licked ever closer. He moved as fast as he could, but it was too slow.

"Yeah," he says, but he doesn't think he believes it. He had tried, tried so hard. But he had been too late. The woman had died before he could reach the waiting paramedics—died in his arms as he had stumbled towards freedom, rasping out apologies and assurances to ears too burnt to hear.

 _Was that how mom died too?_

Neither of them says anything else, both lost in their thoughts, lulled by the clean scent of the falling rain. When the temperature begins to drop with the darkening of the sky, the two set off again, slowly, back towards the car. His brother's presence is enough to ease his mind, if not quite his guilt, as he slides into the driver's seat and ignites the rumbling roar of the engine.

He glances over at his bedraggled brother in the passenger seat, longish hair dripping in the kid's face, and cracks a small smile. It is easily returned with a huff of amusement. He puts the car in drive, picks a direction at random, and drives away, the gentle sound of '80s rock and wet tires on wetter pavement following along in their wake.

* * *

 _Author's Note: Wrote this little beauty for an assignment in my Short Story writing class. Don't know my teacher's opinion on fan fiction, so I kept it rather vague. Tidied it up a bit, but I still feel it could have been better. Used a different writing technique than what I'm used to, but my Supernatural Expert CarsonAvery1234 gave it her full approval so here I am to post! I am truly beginning to love this fandom. Love you all! Take care! God bless!_

 _-TheOneThatGotAway99_


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